Shadrach's Ex Battery and Rescued chickens thread.

[Ladies-Eight]

Ex Batts good morning one and all!

The temperature is 66 with rain off and on.

Have a great day!

 

[Perris]

The entire flock come running when I come out with something in my hand Much faster than for Smudge.

They know that you are a much more reliable provider of treats than is Smudge, Penny - and you don't try to mount them afterwards

 

[ManueB]

I know exactly what you mean. Diana has now totally given up any attempt to put shells on her eggs and every time I find one I feel some relief in that I know she is OK for another 24 hours. I do also watch her behavior very closely.
Conversely Maggie, who really has no business being alive let alone laying (she had a run of Lash eggs about 18 months ago), is going through a frequent laying for spring phase, and every day I beg her to take a break!
Minnie is the only one of mine who seems to have mastered the whole process. She lays a teeny, tiny egg roughly every 4-5 days. You need about 4-5 of them to make a halfway decent-sized omelet but they are worth waiting for.
It is so sad what we have done to the genetics of these lovely creatures.

Sorry if you mentioned it before, Royal chick, but are Diana, Maggie and Minnie also hybrids and / or rescues ?
I wonder if breeds like Leghorn that lay a lot but aren't hybrids like the ISAS also have those kind of troubles.

my top hen, 5 yrs old and a decent layer of good eggs over all those years, produced an egg with a significant blood streak of the sort I normally only see from pullets laying their first. And it was not her first egg this season, but her fourth or fifth. Nor was it unusually large (about 55g if I remember aright).

Were the eggs prior to that bloody one unusual in any way? I wonder if chickens can get hemorrhoids . . .

It has happened once to one of my ex batt and I checked her vent right after and could see nothing. I think it comes from further up.

I do understand the reassurance of hens that have had, or are having problems delivering a fully formed egg, delivering a good one. It is after all one of the signs of health.

No need to apologise on this thread.

Ok (not going to say thank you in case you think it's another of these strange hooman social convention!)

My two Sultans are low in the pecking order, but they have an interesting way of coping with it. Also worth noting that Sophia, who is immediately subordinate to Peanut, does this sort of thing more often.

I have also noticed my lowest ranking hen pairing up with my alpha in some situations. Personally, though I feel I know very little about chickens, I am convinced that thinking their interactions only in term of hierarchy is far too reductive. I think they also have some kind of affinities and dislikes, and also, some intelligence of what social behaviour is most appropriate for their interest in different situations.

 

[GregnLety]

The

Just keep Red away from the turtle ditches.

turtle ditches got me one night. Lol

 

[RoyalChick]

Sorry if you mentioned it before, Royal chick, but are Diana, Maggie and Minnie also hybrids and / or rescues ?
I wonder if breeds like Leghorn that lay a lot but aren't hybrids like the ISAS also have those kind of troubles.



It has happened once to one of my ex batt and I checked her vent right after and could see nothing. I think it comes from further up.

Ok (not going to say thank you in case you think it's another of these strange hooman social convention!)

I have also noticed my lowest ranking hen pairing up with my alpha in some situations. Personally, though I feel I know very little about chickens, I am convinced that thinking their interactions only in term of hierarchy is far too reductive. I think they also have some kind of affinities and dislikes, and also, some intelligence of what social behaviour is most appropriate for their interest in different situations.

Diana and Maggie were part of a school project. I assume they came from Tractor Supply and are therefore hatchery chicks originally.
Diana is an ISA Brown so the whole reproductive issue is part of her breeding (don't get me started).
Maggie is a Rhode Island Red. In theory, unlike Diana, she has not been bred to be expendable, but when I took her to the vet when she was laying lash eggs the vet told me that RIRs had now been bred the same was as the high production breeds.
It makes me so sad.
Minnie is a Crested Cream Legbar and lays blue eggs. Hopefully she has a better chance at a long life. The fact that her eggs are very small is her own invention, I don't think it is normal and her sister (Dotty) lays much larger eggs.

 

[pennyJo1960]

I have like maybe 4 sexlinks that where hatchery birds.
Morning X Batts. Thos are the only hatchery birds left in my flock.

 

[Solanacae]

Beautiful sunny day, and it’s finally feeling like spring! These sunbathing beauties felt the same way.

 

[Marie2020]

Heads down for the blueberries, I kept some back for lady Agatha

 

[no fly zone]

So you've spent time in the ROK too

2-503rd, camp casey 1997-98

 

[Shadrach]

Somehow I knew you would understand.